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Tuesday, October 01, 2013

Back to Papercrafts

So... yeah. I kind of took a break from blogging for a while. I've been [insert excuse here]. The truth is, I just haven't felt like writing. I have been papercrafting lately, though, and I can blog all about that. Rather, I can share pictures! Click on any picture below to see the huge (apologize for cell-phone quality) version.

When my sister joined the Air Force, she left a HUGE stock of stamps, inks, and papers behind and is graciously allowing me almost unbridled use of them. I have a few of my own products as well, and I combined all of our stuff into one craft area. It is so much fun to walk over, grab a basket of stuff, and set to work. Long before I was a quilter, I worked with paper. Getting back into this is like meeting up with an old, old friend. Well, not too old, haha.

Since my sister is letting me use her stash of stamps, I figured most of my cards ought to be for her, right? This was the first card I made on my own. I am so bad with knowing what's what, but the cardstock is generic white stuff from Staples. The stamped swirls were stamped with Versamark ink and dusted with Perfect Pearls Confections set. The striped paper and yellow paper are from some 6"x6" pads I found in a drawer. The "thinking of you" is by Lawn Fawn. No clue about the shiny dots. Corners rounded by a Corner Chomper. Adhesive was by Tombow.

This card was tricky as it is entirely my own design. I get inspiration from Pinterest, but sometimes I just want to do things all by myself. White paper is all plain white cardstock (Staples), and the green is by Recollections from Michaels (I think). I used green ribbon from Jo-Ann Fabrics, green Distress Ink on the vine stamp (no idea), Versamark and green Perfect Pearls on the Lawn Fawn "thanks" stamp, Copic marker in some shade of olive green for the dots around the greeting, and a pokey tool for the pierced paper. Adhesive was by Tombow or Scotch ATG.

Okay, this was pretty much a stolen idea from Pinterest. I didn't come up with this all on my own. However, I did choose a plain pink paper for the background to make the 1" squares and used a Corner Chomper to round opposite corners. The colored paper is all from one set (no idea) of 6"x6" pattered paper cut to 13/16" squares (just a bit more than 3/4"). The "miss you" and heart on lower right panel is part of an alphabet by Lawn Fawn, stamped in Versamark and dusted with pink Perfect Pearls. Adhesive was by Tombow. I sent this one to my sister as well.

Hardest. Card. Ever. Seriously, this card took hours to finish. I started with white cardstock for the card, nothing fancy. The black cardstock, also just generic, got the special treatment. I put a bit of each color of the Perfect Pearls Metallics on my craft sheet, swirled them around a little, added a few spritzes of plain water, then dropped the black cardstock down in the sparkley mess. The pearls stuck and created a pretty galaxy of color on the black paper. I heat set that and cleaned my craft sheet up. Next came the Saturn stamp and stars, stamped over the Perfect Pearls with Memento Dew Drops in metallic colors. I stamped the robot (from Recollections at Michaels, long ago) on black cardstock with Versamark, embossed using Zing! black powder, and used the same Perfect Pearls mixed with a tiny bit of water to hand-paint the robot. I used a Versamark pen to draw a talk bubble around a Versamark stamped Lawn Fawn alphabet "thank you," and dusted Perfect Pearls over those. I used a white gel pen to add the dashed signal lines over the robot's head and a Sakura glitter pen to fill in Saturn's rings. Once I cut the robot out (carefully) along with the talk bubble, both got some foam square adhesive stickers to create relief. Hardest card, but also very cute!

I love! this background stamp. I stamped it with Versamark and dusted it with different shades of blue and white/silver Perfect Pearls. A piece of blue cardstock got small scalloped edges (Fiskars scissors that I've had--literally--since grade school). The "Happy Birthday" was stamped in Memento black, not sure of the stamp brand, on a piece of scrap teal paper I found in a scrap pile. Adhesive pearls add a bit of dimension and mimic the dots found in the background pattern. This card is a lot prettier in person, but it still didn't turn out quite as well as I wanted.

The Man has realized I have a bit of talent for making cards, so he commissioned this card for a relative. I used some very old pink paper for the background (adhered using Scotch ATG) and generic white cardstock for the card base. The scalloped circle is from another paper in that very old set, cut using a Spellbinders die through a Cuttlebug. The castle stamp, banner, heart, star, and "make a wish" are from Lawn Fawn and stamped with Memento black ink. I colored the castle using pink, yellow, and grey Copic markers (yeah, hand-colored, take that craftypeeps). The heart and star are also yellow Copic marker. To make the banner pink, I blended Distress Ink over the cardstock. Once the circle and banner were glued down (Tombow), I used foam squares to pop up the castle, heart, and star. I ran a dashed line in white gel pen around the border of the card and added some Crystal Stickles around the scalloped circle, the castle towers, the heart, and the star.

Sorry to unload this all at once, but I thought these needed to be shared. Also, I need to make more. So many more. So very addicted to card making...

Steal the ideas, sure! I more or less copied other ideas I've seen, so technically you'd be repurposing, not stealing.

I use only Versamark when I want to use Perfect Pearls or embossing. I have rarely used it for watermark-type stamping, but I have plans to do more of that. The vast majority of my stamping is actually with Memento Tuxedo Black ink.

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